Mobile game development has emerged as one of the hottest and most lucrative services in countries like India and Philippines. The reason is obvious- boom in mobile apps and availability of cheap labor available in these countries to get it done. Outsourcing of mobile game development has become one of the hottest outsourcing services in the recent times and has convinced industry experts about its advantages over in-house development. There are various Indian offshore game development company that made a name for Indian developers due to outstanding outsourcing service quality to some of the best gaming studios in US and Europe. But at the same time, due to many lackadaisical Indian game developers, choosing Indian developers as outsourcing companies is tossed between yes and no in the west. As a result there is a burning argument that debates whether mobile game development should stay inhouse or outsourced to Indian developers or not?
According to our opinion outsourcing is advantageous for obvious reasons.
Cost saving- Hiring offshore game development company will lower your costs. While development cost in the Europe or Americas might be upto $100/hr, mobile game development India can accommodate that within $15-$20. That is almost 5x savings in development costs which is huge.
Concentrate on the core activities- According to Tholons research, game programming and game testing are the most common stages that are outsourced by mobile game development companies to Indian developers. This allows the game developing company to concentrate better on the other aspects of the outsourced project or work on other projects parallely.
Flexibility in hiring talent- An off shore game development company can provide developers with a differing software development experience. The same goes for UI/UX designers too. One of the best things that outsourcing game development companies provide is the ability to handpick and create your own team of developers and designers. So if you see a void in your development team pertaining to a programming language etc. you can look outside.
But then why there are arguments against outsourcing?
There are people who had bad experience when they outsourced their projects and opined for inhouse game development instead. Some of the major reasons that can lead to a bad outsourcing experience are-
Not understanding the core competencies- Often times if happens that the off shore game development company does not match the exact requirement needed for the project. An expert off shore game developer which has delivered great quality in game programming for its previous clients might fail in your project due to lack of experience in social integration. Hence it is extremely important to understand their experience and then evaluate the relevance with your project. Having said that, it becomes important to know the requirements first before outsourcing the project.
Outsourcing the entire project to one company- Not every mobile game development company is an expert in every phase of the app development process. While some might have great designers others can have world class programmers. Hence, it is important to know, what part of the project must be outsourced. If you want to save time in app programming then it is better to outsource that part while taking care of the others at your own.
Pushing hard for a fixed cost model- Mobile game development is a creative task at the core. While you may be sure that the process might be complete in X number of days; many creative and technical challenges might put the schedule off track. In such a case pressing the outsourcing company to complete the task on specific time limit will only create a sloppy game app in the end. Not to mention the dissatisfaction on both sides and badmouthing for the off shore game developer after the project.
In-house game development is undoubtedly a preferred way as everything happens under the perview of the core development company. But on the other hand the mighty tradeoffs with respect to flexibility and huge cost saving are something that cannot be sidelined any day. While the smarter ones will reap the benefits, others with gloomy ideas or minimal understanding of the trade might suffer and end up speaking in favor of in-house development.
According to our opinion outsourcing is advantageous for obvious reasons.
Cost saving- Hiring offshore game development company will lower your costs. While development cost in the Europe or Americas might be upto $100/hr, mobile game development India can accommodate that within $15-$20. That is almost 5x savings in development costs which is huge.
Concentrate on the core activities- According to Tholons research, game programming and game testing are the most common stages that are outsourced by mobile game development companies to Indian developers. This allows the game developing company to concentrate better on the other aspects of the outsourced project or work on other projects parallely.
Flexibility in hiring talent- An off shore game development company can provide developers with a differing software development experience. The same goes for UI/UX designers too. One of the best things that outsourcing game development companies provide is the ability to handpick and create your own team of developers and designers. So if you see a void in your development team pertaining to a programming language etc. you can look outside.
But then why there are arguments against outsourcing?
There are people who had bad experience when they outsourced their projects and opined for inhouse game development instead. Some of the major reasons that can lead to a bad outsourcing experience are-
Not understanding the core competencies- Often times if happens that the off shore game development company does not match the exact requirement needed for the project. An expert off shore game developer which has delivered great quality in game programming for its previous clients might fail in your project due to lack of experience in social integration. Hence it is extremely important to understand their experience and then evaluate the relevance with your project. Having said that, it becomes important to know the requirements first before outsourcing the project.
Outsourcing the entire project to one company- Not every mobile game development company is an expert in every phase of the app development process. While some might have great designers others can have world class programmers. Hence, it is important to know, what part of the project must be outsourced. If you want to save time in app programming then it is better to outsource that part while taking care of the others at your own.
Pushing hard for a fixed cost model- Mobile game development is a creative task at the core. While you may be sure that the process might be complete in X number of days; many creative and technical challenges might put the schedule off track. In such a case pressing the outsourcing company to complete the task on specific time limit will only create a sloppy game app in the end. Not to mention the dissatisfaction on both sides and badmouthing for the off shore game developer after the project.
In-house game development is undoubtedly a preferred way as everything happens under the perview of the core development company. But on the other hand the mighty tradeoffs with respect to flexibility and huge cost saving are something that cannot be sidelined any day. While the smarter ones will reap the benefits, others with gloomy ideas or minimal understanding of the trade might suffer and end up speaking in favor of in-house development.